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The latest spate of mass shootings has renewed talk about violent video games, and the New York Times provides an example of just how closely the makers of games work with the makers of guns: When Electronic Arts was getting ready to push its new Medal of Honor Warfighter, it created a website that promoted two big gun manufacturers: Magpul and the McMillan Group. The site had links to the company's online catalogs, at least until criticism from prominent gaming enthusiasts prompted EA to disable the links.

“It was almost like a virtual showroom for guns,” says Ryan Smith, a contributor to gaming magazine Gameological Society. EA and Magpul also posted YouTube video about their ties. Despite what critics like the NRA's Wayne LaPierre might say, no studies have provided a connection to violent games and gun violence. Still, the EA example "illustrates how the firearms and videogame industries have quietly forged a mutually beneficial marketing relationship," write Barry Meier and Andrew Martin of the Times. (Read more gun violence stories.)

I will once again post what I previously said about gun control, so here it is for the last time: Hey wait a minute... what about violent video game legislation which is even more important? The influence toward guns and violence is much more critical! Guns provide the inhumane ego of power. Parents need to teach their children to be human and humane. The REAL message should be: IF VIOLENT VIDEOS AND VIDEO "GAMES" DID NOT PROLIFERATE INTERNET STORES AND VIDEO STORES AND IN THE MOVIES AND ON TELEVISION AND IN BUS TERMINALS.... the INFLUENCE and "FUN" and "ENTERTAINMENT" and INSTRUCTIONAL DEPICTIONS would not be there to ENCOURAGE such totally demented deviant evil behavior in the FIRST place! The PRODUCERS AND PURVEYERS of such violently inhuman PORTRAYALS of violent murderous mayhem will always ridicule and attack anyone who says this is their responsibility when IT IS THIER RESPONSIBILITY AND AN INDICTMENT OF THEIR COMMERCIAL PREJUDICES AND MISDEMEANOR !!!!!!!! What I learned while driving semis was that the cell-phone draws the mind into the cell phone due to non-interruptive interaction, which is why I refused cell phone calls from my employer when I was driving city streets, and I would only talk when I was parked at a loading dock or until I was driving on the freeway where I would not be distracted. The two-way radio, on the other hand, requires each talker to wait until the other(s) are finished talking, and this keeps a driver's mind divorced from the communication medium. The same principle applies with the difference between violent video games and reading a violent story in a book. The reader of a violent book may become excited but not involved... the mere viewing of a violent video not to mention the viewer is participating in a violent video "game" the realities are entirely different! With the violent video game there is an aggrivated enhancement of fantasy becoming actual perception, and that in itself is a reality because it draws the viewer or participant into INVOLVEMENT! The pseudo-claim about violent video games not inspiring violent outbursts is totally a false comparisan, because an angry outburst is not the same thing as behavior corruption! Behavior corruptioj results when a choice becomes exciting and intriguing as a duplication of what a person has learned by PARTICPATING ... i.e. TRAINING... in behavior-corrupt responses that then become learned-behavior modes, such as in dressing in the "costume" of a military commando or SWAT team member and then going out and murdering someone or some people just to see the duplicatig result! That truly is an insanity, but it is a LEARNED insanity never-the-less, and the gratifiation of "winning" violent video "games" only incites and excites the deviant person into wanting to DUPLICATE the encouraged violence of the video game. That ALMOST ALL OF THE MURDERS ARE COMMITTED BY MILITARY OR SWAT TEAM DRESSED MALES I think is a realistic indicator that violent video games are the main cause and provocateur! I am in shock over what happened in Newtown Connecticut! I am a former Army recon scout and my guts are just wrenched over this! And those poor parents right before the holidays! Those poor people! I'm just in shock.

Odaecom

Dec 26, 2012 11:20 AM CST

But even in their games you have to spend time to earn the ability to use high capacity magazines...

g8m3

Dec 26, 2012 8:59 AM CST

Of course shooters play video games like warfighter and call of duty. They are two of the most popular video game franchises in history. I'm sure these kids drank Coke and watched Family Guy too, nobody's blaming those things for school shootings. Black Ops 2 cleared 1 billion in 16 days. I'd be surprised to hear of anyone in the appropriate age group who'd never played it or something like it. This is a stupid argument and the press should really be ashamed of themselves for giving it a voice so frequently.